Wednesday, February 24, 2016

It's challenge time and this week it's Anything Goes! This is a fun challenge, because there are no limits to what you can do. See what the other Watercooler Artists have done here. And check out the winners of last week's challenge - some creative people out there!

For my contribution this week, I pulled out a retired set - D is for Dog - that I will keep forever. Wanted to make a sympathy card for a client of the dog resort where I sometimes work, who had to say goodbye to her sweet miniature Schnauzer, China.

My inspiration for this card came from the phrase: dogs leave footprints on our hearts.

Only two colours of ink were used: Smoky Slate and Watermelon Wonder. The cardstock is Smoky Slate, Whisper White and Watermelon Wonder.

Thursday, February 18, 2016

This month, the Watercooler Gang is all about celebrating. If you are following our Hop in a circular route, you've just come from celebrating with Priscilla.

We all have times of the year that we want to make special - birthdays (everyone has one!) - Mother's Day, Father's Day, weddings, anniversaries - the list goes on. And what better way to mark a special occasion than with a lovingly hand-crafted card?

My first card could be used for almost any occasion. It is also the one I struggled with the most. I wanted to use the 3-step rose image from the Picture Perfect stamp set. For the colours I picked Tangelo Twist and Crushed Curry. Tangelo Twist was used for the first two layers - the first layer it was stamped off once and on the second layer I used it full strength. The leaves are Mint Macaron - again, the first layer is stamped off once.

I was happy with how the colours looked. Then, I was stumped as to what to do with it. So, it didn't get finished until this morning, when I was inspired by none other than Stampin' Up! co-founder and CEO - Shelli Gardner. She had posted what she called Super Simple Cards on her personal blog So Shelli. It was just what I needed.

I'm loving the look of black & white - or in this case, black & Very Vanilla - with a pop of colour. The striped Designer Series Paper is from Farmers Market and the other piece is from Timeless Elegance.The two pieces of DSP are layered onto a Calypso Coral cardstock base. On the rose are some touches of Clear Wink of Stella and the sentiment from Work of Art is stamped with Archival Basic Black onto Very Vanilla.Coincidentally one of my sisters is celebrating a birthday this week and I had to make two birthday cards. Spoiler Alert, Barb, if you see this before the weekend!The first one uses a background piece I had not used for a previous project - read about that here. My inspiration was a Mixed Media class my Mom and I had recently taken.Using an acrylic block, I sponged stripes of colours using Pacific Point, Mint Macaron, Tempting Turquoise and Perfect Plum. After spritizing with water, I stamped the block onto a piece of Whisper White cardstock.Since Mixed Media is all about layers and texture (at least it seems that way to me), I used the flourish stamp from Timeless Textures and stamped it with Crushed Curry. The fern leaf from Butterfly Basics is stamped in Mint Macaron and the greeting, also from Butterfly Basics is stamped with Archival Basic Black. The butterfly is Crushed Curry and Clear Wink of Stella with Rhinestone Basic Jewels.Actually, this came together pretty quickly. I liked the white border around the image and simply mounted it on Crushed Curry for the card base. For more texture, I used the dots stamp from Timeless Textures.

For my second birthday card, I decided to have a little bit of fun! The idea came from a sample I saw posted somewhere - sorry, I didn't make note of where I saw it or who it was created by. If by any chance you happen to see this post, please let me know who you are so I can give you credit.

The stamp set is the adorable Honeycomb Happiness from this year's Sale-a-Bration. I stamped the little chick with Crushed Curry and coloured him with an aquapainter. The cone is Crumb Cake stamped onto a piece of Perfectly Artistic DSP. For the scoops of ice cream I used Early Espresso, Mint Macaron, Daffodil Delight and Cherry Cobbler - all coloured with the aquapainter. I used the sprinkles stamp from Sprinkles of Life on each scoop.

Another one of the fun texture stamps from Timeless Textures inked with Mint Macaron hints of a patch of grass under the chick. Leaving the 'O' off the Hello and using the 'OH' inked with Archival Basic Black they were stamped onto the Crushed Curry marbled pattern from Perfectly Artistic and cut out. The words at the bottom are also from Sprinkles of Life.

And the celebrating continues with Deb - just click on the 'Next' button below.

Wednesday, February 17, 2016

This week we have a lovely colour challenge for you, courtesy of Jean. I love these colours together and I love the ring that inspired her to use these colours. Thanks, Jean for a fun challenge! Take a look:

I have to admit I had another idea for my card - but it didn't work out the way I had anticipated. Mostly because I spent at least half an hour trying to silver emboss the sea star stamp from Picture Perfect before realizing I was trying to emboss with glitter!

After I dug out the silver embossing powder - which worked wonderfully! - I then tried to do the emboss resist technique with each of the colours. But - the design of the stamp did not lend itself to this technique.

By this time it was getting late in the evening. So my next try was to ink up the E block with stripes of each of the ink colours, spritzed it with water and 'stamped' it onto a piece of Whisper White cardstock.

I didn't like the results. Thought I didn't use enough water, maybe? So, inked up the block again, spritzed with more water and stamped it on the other side of the piece of Whisper White cardstock.

Still didn't like the results! Finally, I did what I should have done all along - used watercolour paper! After all, isn't that what it's for?

It was so easy - spritzed a bit of water directly onto the watercolour paper. Used my aquapainter to do a wash of each colour in the same order they are on the ring: Pacific Point, Mint Macaron, Tempting Turquoise, Perfect Plum, Pacific Point.

I fussy cut the sea star, popped it up on dimensionals, stamped the sentiment from Picture Perfect, matted it on Whisper White CS and then onto a Pacific Point card base.

And, Ta-Da - one finished challenge project!

Stay tuned to see what I did with the project that didn't work out. And grab your stamp pads and show us your colours! Check out what the Watercooler Artists have done at the Watercooler Wednesday blog.

Wednesday, February 10, 2016

This week's Watercooler Wednesday Challenge is a technique I have never done before. It truly was a challenge. Thanks Marsha for taking me out of my comfort zone!

Bouncing Brayer technique is a way of using the brayer where you don't roll it over your cardstock. Instead, you ink it up as you normally would, then just touch it to your cardstock to leave a line. Roll the brayer slightly and touch it to the cardstock right beside the first line.

And here's my card:

Pop on over to the Watercooler Wednesday blog to see what the other artists have done with this fun technique. Give it a try and link up your card. I discovered it's fun getting out of the comfort zone!

Tuesday, February 9, 2016

Just a quick post today. I'm playing around with some designs for Easter cards for kids. Of course, I had to use the very cute little chick from the Honeycomb Happiness stamp set that is available during Sale-A-Bration. Get this set FREE with an order of regular product totalling $60 Cdn. What could be better than that?

I pulled out my long-retired Bigz Baskets & Blooms die for the basket - modified slightly to make it smaller. This was fun to put together, even though I didn't have a clear vision of what I was going to do - except for the basket and chicks. So, here it is:

The basket piece is cut from the Crumb Cake sheet in the Perfectly Artistic DSP pack, also available FREE with a $60 Cdn. purchase during SAB. I stamped it with one of the patterns from Timeless Textures, a new set in the Occasions 2016 catalogue, and sponged the edges.

My fringe scissors made the perfect grass, cut from Cucumber Crush cardstock, as well as to make the filler in the basket using Watermelon Wonder cardstock.

At first, I wasn't sure how I wanted to use the balloon stamp that comes in the Honeycomb Happiness set. I stamped just the balloon part onto Whisper White, coloured them with Watermelon Wonder and a blender pen then used clear Wink of Stella to give them a lovely shine. And fussy cut them.

After all that work, I thought, hmmm - why didn't I just stamp them right onto the cardstock I was using on my card???? Apparently because I like to take the difficult route!

The chicks were also stamped first onto Whisper White CS, coloured with Hello Honey using a blender pen, and fussy cut. Used up some retired thick Baker's Twine - I think it is Bermuda Bay - to make a bow for the handle of the basket.

Just realized it needs a greeting. Will have to add that later. Thanks for looking!

Saturday, February 6, 2016

This week the challenge over at Watercooler Wednesday is a Sketch Challenge. Heidi has given us this sketch to follow:

At first glance, it looks like there are a lot of elements to this. But, it's not as complicated as it looks. I thought it was a good design for me to use some upcycled material, like this lovely copper foil bag that once contained coffee. I couldn't bear to throw it in the recycle bin, so recycled it instead on my card.

Look what I did with it:

I decided this sketch worked best as a square. The base of the card is Tip Top Taupe. Next, I layered the lovely script design from the Neutrals paper stack. The copper squares were embossed with the Brick Wall Embossing folder.

The sentiment is from the Wetlands stamp set and is stamped with Tuxedo Black Memento Ink over the flourish from Timeless Textures which is Tip Top Taupe, stamped off once. The Whisper White is matted with a square of Mossy Meadow. I love the rich, dark green against the shiny copper.

Check out the other challenge entries at the Watercooler Wednesday blog. There is still time for you to get in on the fun!

challenge winner

Watercooler Wednesday Challenge

Honourable Mention

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